


and everything is green and submarine

by cedartrees



Series: Dead Man's Hand [2]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Also this was written at like two in the morning so pleae forgive me for any spelling, And grammar mistakes, Chickens, Crying over chickens and the lack of them in the Commonwealth, F/M, Its november and everyone is cold
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-27
Updated: 2017-05-27
Packaged: 2018-11-05 15:44:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,571
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11016498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cedartrees/pseuds/cedartrees
Summary: MacCready and the boss hole up in an empty shack to wait out a radstorm. Safe and sound in their shelter, Sylvie threatens to jab a needle through her mercenary's eye and Mac doesn't believe chickens are real.





	and everything is green and submarine

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT* sorta revised this, added some more to it. Hopefully everything meshes together.
> 
> What else do you call a sleeping roll? Sleeping bundle? Napping blanket?

"Think about your hero

When you're at Ground Zero

And crawl out through the fallout back to me..."

Sylvie skipped along to the tune spilling from her Pip Boy, hopping from one side of the train tracks to the other. MacCready trailed along behind her solemnly. It had been just about a week since she'd hired him. They'd stopped by a place called Hangman's Alley and cleared out the raiders holed up in it. It had been a very up close and personal skirmish and the boss had surprised Mac with her bladed tire iron. She wielded it effectively and took out raiders impressively quick.

Afterwords, they looted the place and Sylvie set up a radio beacon. She was with the Minutemen, she explained, and they wanted this place for a settlement. Mac had thought the Minutemen had died off after Quincy, but apparently not.

They were traveling to Sanctuary Hills now, loaded down with all the junk Sylvie was so keen on picking up. The other evening, as they set up camp for the night, Mac had counted twenty eight cigarette cartons squished into a side pocket of her backpack. Twenty eight. He hadn't just been hired by a chatterbox, he'd been hired by a packrat too.

Thunder crackled in the distance and he eyed the sickly green clouds on the horizon. The boss followed his gaze and frowned. "Radstorm. Oh joy." She said unhappily. "Better find a place to hole up unless you wanna start glowing." He stated. Sylvie pushed her glasses up her nose and glanced around. Mac was beginning to recognize the gesture as something she did when she was considering something.

They were on a slight ridge, rotted train tracks stretched out along the ground. It was quiet except for the approaching storm and a few mangy crows kicking up a fuss in the trees. He watched her peer at a smudgy shape in the distance and point to it. "That look like a shack to you?" He eyed it and then shrugged. "We'll find out."

It did in fact, turn out to be a shack. Small and dusty it looked like somebody's pre-war cabin that had survived the bombs. There was one window that Sylvie boarded up with some of the junk she carried around with her and a single, surprisingly sturdy, door in. Mac wedged the door shut with a rickety chair and lit several candles, combing the tiny shack for cellar entrances, hatches and sheltering vermin.

Sylvie sat down crosslegged next to the candles, fishing Chopper and a whetstone from her backpack. The bladed tire iron was clean and remarkably well put together, the blade securely lashed to the tire iron. The metal was shiny and raw where letters had been scratched into the handle.

"Why do ya use that thing?" Mac inquired, crouching with his back to the wall opposite the boss.  
She answered without looking up from sharpening the blade on the whetstone. "I'm just really fond of Chopper." She motioned to the firearm hanging off the side of her pack. "I've got a heavily modded combat shotgun called Kingslayer, which you are only allowed to touch in the event of an emergency, and a sub-machine gun called Zippy, which is back at Sanctuary, that I use too. But I just really like Chopper." The boss shrugged.

"Why the names though?"

"Just makes things easier. I can just tell you to throw me Snap or Zippy and it's simpler than asking for the Compensated Silenced High Powered Marksman .44 Pistol or whatever."

Mac nodded. "Makes sense." He admitted.

"So if I ask for Kingslayer, I want the combat shotgun. If I ask for Zippy, toss me the tommy gun. Snap is the snub-nosed .44. Chopper is the bladed tire iron. And if I ask for The Big Bang, you hand it over and then run."

His head cocked to one side. "The Big Bang?"

Her smile was wolfish and feral. "Fat Man." Was all she said.

Mac's eyes bugged out of his head. "You've got a fu- er, friggen Fat Man?" He spluttered.

She leaned back, grinning smugly. "Yep, back at Sanctuary. Two actually, but I only ever use one."

"You're kidding."

"Serious as a heartattack. Cross my heart and hope to die." She stuffed Chopper into a sheath and put the whetstone away. "Remind me when we get to Sanctuary and I'll show you The Big Bang."  
She bent and fished around in her backpack. Mac watched her pull out a mass of what looked like thread and scraps of fabric. She untangled the string and carefully seperated out several slups of blue fabric.

"What're you doing?" He queried.  
"Sewing." She was silent after that for several moments. Mac picked at hangnails and listened to the storm rumble ever closer.

"Can you turn around for a mo'?" The boss eventually said, looking at him and pointing to the wall.

"Why?" Mac eyed her warily, if she intended to get rid of him now, she wasn't being very subtle about it.

Sylvie let out a suffering sigh. "Because i'm going to patch my vault suit and to do that I need to take it off. Can you please turn around so I can change?" Mac flushed red with embarrassment and faced the wall.

"Oh."

Sylvie let out a snort of laughter from behind him. "Oh, is right."

It wasn't long till she let him know he could turn around. When he did, she was crosslegged on the floor in ragged pants and a tank top carefully threading a strand of blue thread through a needle. "If you've got anything that needs patched, lemme know. I can fix it." She said and then began stitching shut a thin slit in the fabric of the vault suit. "Like... oh I don't know, your duster." The boss added in a low mutter.

Mac frowned at her, but didn't rise to the bait, instead crossing his arms and slumping down agaunst the far wall. Thunder rumbled over and the wind whistled. Sylvie's Pip Boy gave a few ticks and she scooted away from the wall, dragging her supplies with her. Mac eyed the wall he was leaning against and figured it was in his best interests to join the boss in the center of the room.

Up close, it was obvious the suit had been patched countless times. Patches of various blue shades covered the elbows and knees. As she flipped the suit over to patch a hole in the collar, Mac noticed lines of stitching and almost perfect patching across the small of the back. The patching ran from one side to the other and curved up slightly. He hadn't realized he'd been staring until Sylvie turned to glare at him over the top of her glasses.

"Want something?"

MacCready shrugged. "How did you suit get all tore up?" He pointed to the patches across the back. Mac could see her tense at his question, consider it for a moment, her eyes narrowed. "Got beat up a while back, wild mongrel surprised me." A likely story. Almost convincing. Mac didn't really believe her, but he didn't press it either.

Sylvie let out a puff of air and pushed the vault suit away. She reached for his leg and Mac flinched away. "Relax!" Sylvie hissed. "I'm just going to fix the hole in your pants, not hamstring you." She dug out some thread and a patch of fabric that were almost the same color as the frayed pants he wore.

"Aww, if you want me outta my pants, all you have to do is ask." Mac batted his eyes at her and smiled crookedly. "I'm of a mind to jab this needle through your eyeball." The boss snarled and looped one arm around his leg, jerking it over. Mac flopped to the floor, crossing his arms behind his head. He stifled a yawn and let his eyes drift half shut. Mac was vulnerable, and knew it, but darn it he was exhausted.

The hole was patched quickly and Mac retrieved his leg, surveying Sylvie's handiwork as she put away the thread and fabric. The stitching was tiny and neat, and the patch was only a shade or two darker than his pants. "Pretty nice, boss. Now I won't freeze the skin of my knee off."

"That's good. I wouldn't want to have to lug you around along with all my scraps just because your leg got cold." She pulled the sleeping rolls from the packs. "I'll take first watch tonight." The boss tossed a tightly folded roll to Mac, he caught it and shook his head. "Nah, boss. I can take first watch." She glared at him.

"Sure. And by second watch, because you're such a thoughtful guy and I'm sleeping so peacefully, you'll just keep on keeping watch." Sylvie rolled her eyes at him.

"I let you get away with it those first couple times 'cause I'm a nice lady." She zipped up the packs and tugged her fedora down low on her head. "I'll take first watch. You sleep. I'm not going to cut your throat as you dream, kid."

For a moment her eyes softened and she looked hurt. MacCready wondered briefly where she'd grown up if she wasn't worried about a knife in the back. Certainly not the Capital Wasteland or the Commonwealth. He huffed and muttered a grumpy 'fine', shaking open the sleeping roll and burrowing into it.

She blew out the candles and crouched a couple feet from him, a blackened creature in the darkness. Mac watched her for several minutes, tense and wary. But his eyelids began to droop, mind growing fuzzy and pleasantly blank as sleep fell over him.

She woke him sometime deep in the night, yawning an 'all clear' and removing her glasses, before curling up in her sleeping roll. Mac shivered in the brisk chill, wrapping his duster tight around. Stupid cold. Stupid winter. He thought, a grumpy scowl creasing his face. It was early November and only going to get colder. At least it was to cold to fall sleep keeping watch.

Towards dawn, Sylvie began to wake up and MacCready stretched his stiff limbs. His breath puffed out in the chill air and the boss wrapped her sleeping roll around herself, teeth chattering.

"Why can't it be summer? I've had enough cold to last several generations..." She mumbled. Mac rubbed his hands together, stuffing them under his arms. "Heh, don't worry boss. It's only gonna get colder."

"Frick." He heard her mutter. "At least there's snow to look foward to. Wait, does it still snow? You know, white flakes that fall from the clouds when it's cold?"

"Yeah, boss. I know what snow is. Happens occasionaly. I've seen it twice in my life."

A look settled on her face, halfway between sad and furious. "Joy." She didn't sound particularly joyful however. Mac shivered and pulled his cap lower down on his head. "What do you even care about snow? It's freakin' cold and nasty."

The boss sighed quietly. "I remember one winter when it snowed a week straight. They canceled school and my sister and I built an igloo." Mac leaned forward curiously. A sister? School? The more he learned about the boss, the more confusing and intriguing she became.

"What's an igloo?" He pried cautiously.

"It's a house made of snow or ice." She said distractedly. "It took forever for my sis and i to support that thing properly. But once it was done, we brought a couple of the chickens in. They loved it. One old half blind hen kept trying to nest in the walls."

Okay now things were getting farfetched. "Chickens? Chickens are a faery tale." Mac shook his head.

Sylvie's head snapped up, staring him down. "Oh pull the other one, it plays jingle bells! Come on, chickens are not a faery tale."

He shrugged. Mac had never seen a chicken, nobody he'd ever come across had seen a chicken. They were stories mothers told their children, not pets you brought into ice houses or whatever. "They don't exist. They're stories. A funny little made up creature to make children laugh." Duncan loves the story about the red hen and the bread... He added silently, the words never leaving his head.

The boss slumped, wrapping her sleeping roll tightly around herself. Mac was surprised to see her eyes bright with unshed tears. "Shanks." She mumbled into the sleeping roll. "Really?"

He nodded, confused.

"I guess they just... didn't cut it. Poor birds." She sniffled and was very silent for several moments.

"I'm... really fu- freaking confused." MacCready was at a loss. Nothing about the boss made sense.

"Chickens! I refuse to believe they're gone! It doesn't make a lick of sense. There are crows and gulls, why aren't there chickens...?" Tears leaked from the boss' eyes and she scrubbed them away with one hand. But they kept coming and eventually Sylvie gave up wiping them away and just curled up on the floor, sobbing and sniffling.

Mac cautiously placed a cold hand on her shoulder. She rose halfway up and buried her face in his duster. "Not my birds. Please. Please." She wailed. Mac carefully peeled back a bit of the sleeping roll wrapped around her, exposing a freckled wrist.

No track marks. Probably not drugs then. Sick maybe? Crazy? There was some creepy old lady Mac had run into several years back, claimed she could 'see his future'. Was that it? Was the boss some sort of psychic?

"You're gonna have to fill me in. I got no idea what you're talking about."

She sniffled and shifted so she was leaning against him. "Sorry, I know its confusing." Sylvie croaked.

"I'm a vault dweller. But not like the folks who lived in the fault for tens of years, growing and raising families. Vault-Tec froze me and everyone else in Vault 111, kept us suspened in cryostasis or whatever for 230+ years."

230 years... Mac stared at her. "You're pre-war!" He blurted out.

She nodded stiffly. "You wouldn't believe how green it was then. Everything was so alive and vibrant." The boss fell silent.

MacCready didn't say anything either. He'd known she was a vault dweller, it was obvious. But pre-war? Nah. However, things about her that had previously confounded Mac, now began to make sense.

"So now will you believe me when I tell you chickens are real?" She asked quietly.

He patted her shoulder, glad stuff was sort of making sense. "I guess."

The boss smiled and scootched away, shrugging out of the sleeping roll. "Here. You're probably frozen." She draped the sleeping roll over his shoulders and crouched down to fish around in the packs. Mac slouched, uncurling underneath the sleeping roll. It was so warm.

Behind him, the boss pried off the junk she'd used to board the window. "Storm's passed. Looks like it's just past sunrise." Mac reluctantly shed the sleeping roll, the cold like a slap to the face but at least he could feel his fingers again.

"We should be able to make Sanctuary by evening. It's not too far from here." The boss said as she twisted the dials on her Pip-Boy. "Might stop by Abernathy farm for lunch, we'll pass right by them."

Mac slung his rifle over one shoulder. "Sounds good, boss."

"Alrighty then, lets head out."


End file.
